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Grand Wheel
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An experimental walk through the modern Peace Movement in the United States.
In addition to the USA screenings, the sometimes controversial short has recently found a global audience, with festival screenings in Russia, Germany, Spain, Italy, Greece and Denmark. It was also awarded the Special Jury Prize for Best Cinematography at the 2008 Canadian Film Festival in Toronto.
If you like the film, please help us out by casting a vote at the IMDB!
In addition to the USA screenings, the sometimes controversial short has recently found a global audience, with festival screenings in Russia, Germany, Spain, Italy, Greece and Denmark. It was also awarded the Special Jury Prize for Best Cinematography at the 2008 Canadian Film Festival in Toronto.
If you like the film, please help us out by casting a vote at the IMDB!
Oct 19, 2008 12:57 PM
Re: Grand Wheel
Peace is a lovely notion, but it isn't a choice you make one morning after having some especially thoughtful bacon. I don't know that half of the people who rally for peace know what kind of work would be required on their end. Even if we stopped all wars, the world would be full of inequity and pain, in large part due to our modern lifestyle that counts on the third world to be the third world. It is good that people are turned off by war, but who does like war, I mean really likes war? War is just an acute outbreak of a more serious problem. Chimps and bonobos have been known for some time to engage in organized warfare over territory and females - resources. Are we really different? Can we overcome our own myopic self-interest? Or would we have evolved this brain for nothing? It would really take a lot people making hard decisions not only about who they vote for, but about how they live to make a difference. Posing as a prisnoner in Abu Ghraib simply doesn't cut it, and it actually makes people feel awfully awkward, to little effect. You have the power, not only in your vote, but in your dollar and how you spend it. Think about that the next time you don your nike shoes and buy some African-farmer-unfriendly-unfair-trade Starbucks coffee before going to one of these rallies.
By: boyblunders
Re: Grand Wheel
We could also recognize that we have found the path to world peace, it is right in front of our noses. If you look at the history of North America and Europe, it is a history of warfare. But now, Missouri will never fight Kansas, France will never fight Britain, ect... Even Japan will never fight Korea ever again. How can such historic enemies with growing populations never fight wars ever again? Because they have accepted common values. Representational government, free trade, and human rights for individuals. Nations that do not adopt these are doomed to perpetual warfare. America is not the source of conflict and an inhibitor to peace. Its not about resources either. Its about tribalism, ethnic hatred and religious fundamentalism.
The greatest challenge of the21st century will be for people in the western, developed world to champion the successes of their homelands and to recognize that poor, exotic brown people can also be evil sometimes. Fascism always grows ascendent on a platform of social justice and fighting oppression. We must not let post-colonial guilt blind us into thinking Islamic extermists have the right of way, or that we must apoligize to them so they wont hate us.
The greatest challenge of the21st century will be for people in the western, developed world to champion the successes of their homelands and to recognize that poor, exotic brown people can also be evil sometimes. Fascism always grows ascendent on a platform of social justice and fighting oppression. We must not let post-colonial guilt blind us into thinking Islamic extermists have the right of way, or that we must apoligize to them so they wont hate us.
By: poonhound
Re: Grand Wheel
Please elaborate regarding your views on the poor brown people.
Kindly let us know about your positions regarding the successes of their Western homelands and how they did occur without reason for post-colonial guilt. Was a country that was founded by wealthy slave owners who proclaimed that all men are created equal just a little bit askew or do you find that to be perfectly reasonable?
Kindly let us know about your positions regarding the successes of their Western homelands and how they did occur without reason for post-colonial guilt. Was a country that was founded by wealthy slave owners who proclaimed that all men are created equal just a little bit askew or do you find that to be perfectly reasonable?
By: spam_vigilante
Re: Grand Wheel
The sins of the West are the sins of all humanity. Slavery has existed for 10's of thousands of years of human civilization, amongst every tribe on every continent on this planet. All of the horrors that we acknowledge to have happened here have happened everywhere else, without exception.
However, the accomplishments of the west, those which I have outlined above, were unique to the west, in that they were first established here and are now taken for granted. America was the first true democratic republic ever. The first abolishonist and womens sufferage movements began here. On the other hand, Saudi Arabia officially abolished slavery in 1967 (under pressure from the British) and its still not enforced. Do I even have to mention the women?
Nowadays, we tolerate intolerance in the name of diversity and multiculturalism, because we conflate culture, race and class into one victimized group whose passions must be assuaged by the "establishment". To criticize Islamic theology is "racist" and therefore we cannot truly confront the source of global instability.
Instead, we assign blame to the nearest white person or Jew, because they are supposedly on the top of the totem pole, and the brown people are "noble savages" who are victims of oppression which naturally stimulates them into blowing up dozens of innocents, as we seem to expect them to do.
I find that aspect of multiculturalism to be truly racist - the soft bigotry of low expectations.
However, the accomplishments of the west, those which I have outlined above, were unique to the west, in that they were first established here and are now taken for granted. America was the first true democratic republic ever. The first abolishonist and womens sufferage movements began here. On the other hand, Saudi Arabia officially abolished slavery in 1967 (under pressure from the British) and its still not enforced. Do I even have to mention the women?
Nowadays, we tolerate intolerance in the name of diversity and multiculturalism, because we conflate culture, race and class into one victimized group whose passions must be assuaged by the "establishment". To criticize Islamic theology is "racist" and therefore we cannot truly confront the source of global instability.
Instead, we assign blame to the nearest white person or Jew, because they are supposedly on the top of the totem pole, and the brown people are "noble savages" who are victims of oppression which naturally stimulates them into blowing up dozens of innocents, as we seem to expect them to do.
I find that aspect of multiculturalism to be truly racist - the soft bigotry of low expectations.
By: poonhound
Re: Grand Wheel
Thank you for the clarification.
So then we, of the West, can feel superior to our Muslim friends because we are able to emboss our values systems onto them? I'm just asking because your explanation is making this all so very much more unclear.
How do you suppose they feel about us drinking alcohol, which the Quran strictly forbids? Or for letting our women prance about in skimpy clothes, which the prophet Mohammed prohibited? Should they feel inferior or superior to us, of the West?
So then we, of the West, can feel superior to our Muslim friends because we are able to emboss our values systems onto them? I'm just asking because your explanation is making this all so very much more unclear.
How do you suppose they feel about us drinking alcohol, which the Quran strictly forbids? Or for letting our women prance about in skimpy clothes, which the prophet Mohammed prohibited? Should they feel inferior or superior to us, of the West?
By: spam_vigilante
Re: Grand Wheel
Didn't know if you noticed, but they are trying to emboss their values onto us, not the other way around. It is possible for brown people to have imperialist ambitions too.
If they feel so bad about our drinking, or scantily clad women, is that a reason to commit an act of violence? Because there have been thousands of attacks in the name of Islam for that very reason. The violent attacks are the threat to peace, not the trivial matters that "stimulate" them.
The Prophet Mohammad endorsed polygamy, slavery, child-marriage, extortion of Jews and Christians, not to mention the death penalty for apostasy, homosexuality and adultery. Those values are inferior. Period. It has nothing to do with who is more powerful or who is imposing what onto whom.
We should feel no shame pointing this out, or even prosteletizing our values to them because innocent victims are involved.
Innocent people are oppressed and do get killed because of Islamic law, and in the name of universal peace and justice we should try to help them. In addition, the Islamic mandate of Jihad threatens us all.
If they feel so bad about our drinking, or scantily clad women, is that a reason to commit an act of violence? Because there have been thousands of attacks in the name of Islam for that very reason. The violent attacks are the threat to peace, not the trivial matters that "stimulate" them.
The Prophet Mohammad endorsed polygamy, slavery, child-marriage, extortion of Jews and Christians, not to mention the death penalty for apostasy, homosexuality and adultery. Those values are inferior. Period. It has nothing to do with who is more powerful or who is imposing what onto whom.
We should feel no shame pointing this out, or even prosteletizing our values to them because innocent victims are involved.
Innocent people are oppressed and do get killed because of Islamic law, and in the name of universal peace and justice we should try to help them. In addition, the Islamic mandate of Jihad threatens us all.
By: poonhound
Re: Grand Wheel
I find people who gather every Sunday to absolve themselves of guilt before an invisible man in the sky and compare their clothes to each other to have values that are inferior.
But hey, thanks again for the spirited discussion. Looks like you'd claim the sky to be green if I told you it was blue. No getting through that dense cranium, eh?
But hey, thanks again for the spirited discussion. Looks like you'd claim the sky to be green if I told you it was blue. No getting through that dense cranium, eh?
By: spam_vigilante
Re: Grand Wheel
Thanks for the moral equivalence. I'll be sure to tell the families of those 2 teenagers who were tortured and executed by the Iranian government for being homosexuals that you believe you have suffered equally as they because you and your openly gay parter can't get a marriage liscense in California.
Meanwhile, "Peace Activists" from code Pink pledge their solidarity with the fascist Iranian regime:
http://ltnixonrants.blogspot.com/2008/11/code-pink-blogs-from-iran-about-its.html
Meanwhile, "Peace Activists" from code Pink pledge their solidarity with the fascist Iranian regime:
http://ltnixonrants.blogspot.com/2008/11/code-pink-blogs-from-iran-about-its.html
By: poonhound
